


First Days

by CastielFollowMe



Series: Single Dad Shiro Verse [21]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Day Care, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Keith is a shy baby, Lance wants to fight, first days of school, protective friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-10
Updated: 2017-02-10
Packaged: 2018-09-23 06:23:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9644240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CastielFollowMe/pseuds/CastielFollowMe
Summary: It's Keith's first day of daycare and he's a little nervous but thankfully he meets some new friends to help him while his daddy is away.





	

“Keith, don’t you want to greet your classmates?” Shiro looked down, at the lump that was his son, clinging tightly to his leg. Keith’s galaxy themed backpack was nearly falling off his little shoulders, while his face was pressed up against Shiro’s slacks.  
Shiro’s stomach churned nervously. Maybe he should try to get a job at home.

“Shiro! Hello, I’m so happy you could make it.” Before Shiro had any time to contemplate sneaking Keith with him, out the back door, Allura was smiling right in front of him. He blinked, feeling a smile of his own.

“Hello Allura. I really appreciate you doing this for me, and I promise once everything’s settled, we can start payments –”

Allura merely waved him off. “Oh hush up. We’re not here to talk about that right now. I do believe introductions are in order.” Her smile softened while her eagerness slowly calmed down. Then she was bending down to Keith’s height. Shiro could see Keith peeking out from behind his leg, no doubt glaring at his new teacher.

“Allura, this is my son Keith. Keith, this is your new caretaker, Allura. Can you wave to her?” Shiro put a hand behind Keith’s backpack and gently pushed the child forward. With a frown, Keith avoided eye contact with Allura and instead focused on the straps on his backpack. Noticing that one was too loose, he immediately pointed at it and turned to Shiro. Shiro sighed at Keith’s ability to completely ignore anyone he wanted, but Allura didn’t look irritated or offended at all by Keith’s behavior.

_That’s unusual._

“Yes Keith, I’ll fix it. But can you please look at Allura?” Shiro knelt down to fix the strap on Keith’s backpack. Though he hesitated, Keith eventually turned his body in the general direction of Allura, who smiled.

“Hello there Keith! I’ll be taking care of you while your dad’s away at work, alright? How old are you?” She watched as Keith began to tug on his hair in a repeated manner, while his eyes scanned the classroom. She filed this memory away in her brain for future reference. Shiro waited patiently, while Keith looked as if he were ignoring them, but he knew that the child wasn’t.

Then Keith held up four fingers.

“Four? Wow, that’s a good age. Everyone else here is too, except for Hunk. He’s five.” Allura beamed but Keith only continued to silently stroke his hair. She gave the boy one last look, before standing up with Shiro.

“I should be back by three.” Shiro finally said, glancing at his watch. _Five hours. That’s the longest I’ve left him alone._ “I’m guess all the other kids will be here soon?” He looked around and noticed that there were only three other kids in the room with them.

One had what looked like bed-head, spiking up in all sorts of crazy directions, with big wired glasses, and was meticulously cutting strips of paper into piles. Another, was a hyperactive young boy, with dark skin, who was bouncing back and forth between the chest of toys and the art supplies. Beside him, another larger boy was coloring on his own piece of paper with crayons.

That was it.

“Nope. This is it.” Allura said.

Shiro blinked. “Wait? You’re telling me that you only watch 3 kids?”

“As for me personally, yes. However, my school has over 400 kids with several different grade levels, teachers and such. This is my personal daycare.” Allura nodded and Shiro was shocked. “I usually take on kids with special or different needs that most kids and do better in a different environment. I’ve found that the less kids there are the better it helps, so this might help with Keith’s separation anxiety and overstimulation. However, there’s still recess and lunch and free time so the kids won’t be completed isolated from kids their age.”

Shiro looked down at Keith, unable to actually respond to Allura. For the first time in years, Keith looked calmer than Shiro had ever seen him when dropping him off. Of course, Keith was still a ball of nerves but he was faring much better than the last daycare.

Before he was kicked out.

Though, before Shiro had the chance to thank Allura properly, they were interrupted by a loud shriek.

“YOU’RE THE KID WHO KICKED SAND AT ME!!”

x.x.V.x.x

Lance’s glare was not very intimidating, especially for a four-year-old as himself. Currently, the focus of his glare was on the long, dark-haired new kid sitting across from him. The same kid who had knocked down his sand castle, after Lance had tried to befriend him, a few weeks back.

Keith.

His eternal rival, of whom he shall fight.

He knew what that word meant. He’d heard his parents say it multiple times when speaking about the other Hispanic restaurant owners in town.

At the moment, Keith was seated beside Pidge and helping them to wipe down their desks. Keith didn’t actually have a wipe in his hand, nor was he actually wiping anything down (Lance couldn’t believe the laziness of this kid), but he was constantly pointing out a dirty spot to Pidge, who scrubbed furiously at it. 

“Can you believe him, Hunk?” Lance turned to his best friend in the entire world.

Timidly, Hunk looked up from his drawing and started twisting the crayons in his grip.

“U-Um…maybe? I don’t know.” Hunk shrugged nervously, but Lance’s attention was already focused on Keith and the toy dinosaurs that Pidge had gotten out from the toy chest. Keith was seated and playing with a single dinosaur while Pidge lined their toys around them. Neither bothered to interact much or touch each other’s toy, which Lance thinks is weird.

He proceeded to tell Keith this as he stomped over to him.

“You’re supposed to be playing! Like, Godzilla or Jurassic Park or something. Or maybe dinosaurs in space? I can totally see that. There’s a giant T-Rex that landed on the moon, and destroying everything in its path, so humans send out an army of velociraptors to defeat it. Then there’s this epic battle between them, where the moon flings towards Earth and everything explodes –” Lance finds himself easily getting off topic as he plopped down next to Keith, already grabbing a dinosaur in his hand. Keith blinked slowly.

“That’s stupid.”

Lance looked positively offended by this. “How dare you! It is not!”

“Yeah. Dinosaurs can’t live in space.”

“So can. Have you ever met a dinosaur?”

“No. Have you?”

“Well no…but that doesn’t mean they can’t!”

“It doesn’t mean they can.”

“Well I bet my dinosaur can beat yours to the edge of the classroom!” Lance suddenly shot to his feet, full of embarrassment and fury. He watched in shock as Keith quickly followed in suit; eyes blazing with new light.

“You’re on.”

x.x.V.x.x

“Ah, um, uh, hello?” Hunk could feel sweat dripping down his neck when Keith continued to stare at him. At the moment, Lance and Hunk were getting their lunch sandwiches from Ms. Allura, leaving him alone with Keith. Hunk wasn’t all that great at conversations. Or talking to people. Or making friends.

Keith blinked.

Nervously, Hunk tried to take a bite of his sandwich, unable to properly speak to the boy sitting next to him. It was obvious that he was bad in these social situations. However, Keith finally looked back at his sandwich. And stared.

“Um, t-these sandwiches are yummy, h-huh?” Hunk chuckled nervously before washing his food down with some milk. Keith, however, continued to stare at his sandwich. Then he returned to staring at Hunk. Hunk swallowed.

“Uh, I’m sorry? W-Why are you staring?” Hunk squeaked. Keith silently picked up his plate, before pushing it towards Hunk. Hunk immediately jumped in surprise. “What?! N-No, this is your sandwich! I-I can’t take it.” Keith’s frown only tightened. He was quick to pull apart the bread so the peanut butter and jelly was facing them now. Then, he pushed the plate to Hunk.

Hunk’s eyes widened. He couldn’t figure out what this kid wanted from him and it was starting to freak him out. He tried to gather Lance’s attention but Lance was too busy jumping for his sandwich to notice. Hunk sighed.

He looked back at Keith to find the peanut butter part pushed towards him.

“You don’t like Peanut Butter?” Hunk decided to try and ask. Keith’s frown softened and he shook his head. _Oh? Is he trying to tell me something?_ Hunk looked closer at the sandwich before him before noticing the large chunks.

“Ooooh. Do you not like the chunks?” At this Keith nodded seriously. Then Hunk smiled. “Oh, okay, h-here, let me help. I-I can get them out for you.” He took the sandwich from Keith, watching to see if he made the wrong decision, but it seemed this was what Keith wanted. Keith patiently waited while Hunk tried to take out all the hard chunks of peanut butter with a napkin, ignoring his own lunch at the moment.

It was all worth it, when Keith scooted closer to him once he began to eat his sandwich, after Hunk was done.

The drawing that Keith also made, with superhero Hunk, was also worth it.

x.x.V.x.x

At three o’clock on the dot, Shiro walked into the daycare classroom, ignoring the fact that he had sat in his car for at least twenty minutes, debating if he should pick up Keith early. He was pleasantly surprised to not have received a single phone call from Allura while at work. He knew that this would not be an everyday occurrence, even if this school was magical and built on miracles, but for now he would treasure it.

“Oh, hello Shiro!” Allura waved from where she was helping Hunk wash his hands. Shiro noticed several paintings, representing some forms of shapes and people (there was possibly a three-headed dog in one of them?) scattered across a table. 

He smiled when he felt a familiar tug on his shirt and looked down to see Keith beside him. Keith glanced up at Shiro for a second, before looking back at the table of paintings. Shiro knelt down next to him.

“Hello Keith, did you have a good day?” Shiro noticed the tense posture in Keith’s back beginning to soften upon touch from Shiro. Even if Allura had not called him for any problems today, didn’t mean that five hours wasn’t a long time for Keith. Five hours looked like it would be all that Keith would be able to handle, and Shiro was more than okay with that.

Keith nodded, twisting the fabric of Shiro’s shirt in his hand. He let go for a second, giving Shiro the chance to collect Keith’s things, including a painting of what Shiro assumed was a red cat. He smiled at Allura.

“Thanks for all this. I’ve never seen Keith so quiet before. Were there any problems?” Shiro asked. From the corner of his eyes he noticed that Keith was next to the others kids of this class and felt his heart warm.

“Well, Lance and Keith got into a small rivalry, where neither of them would stop running. Keith also wouldn’t speak with anyone during the first few hours – I think he missed you.” Allura responded.

Shiro sighed. “I’m sorry if it’s too much trouble.

“Not at all, Shiro. Keith is a darling little boy, a bit temperamental, but he’s a good boy. I think he’ll be a delightful addition to our class.” Allura waved Shiro’s worries aside, causing Shiro’s jaw to drop. This was, honestly, the first teacher who made Shiro want to cry, rather than make Shiro angry.

Guess he must have actually cried.

“Shiro?!”

“I’m sorry. It’s nothing. I’m just, happy that someone else sees Keith for who he really is.” Shiro chuckled, wiping away a tear from his eyes. He missed the gentle look that Allura sent his way before there was another tug on his shirt. Before Keith could see his tears, Shiro put on a smile and knelt down. Keith was twiddling with his fingers, but the three other children in the class were all around them.

“Keith? Are these your friends?” Keith nodded but remained quiet. “Keith, use your words please. Can you tell me who they are?”

Keith hesitated and looked at everyone for less than a second. “Lance. Hunk. Pidge. They’re my friends.” Even though Keith didn’t point them out, Shiro could figure out who was who and he beamed at the kids. Their eyes sparkled at the bright and warm smile given to them from this stranger.

“Hello! My name is Shiro and I’m Keith’s dad. Thank you kids, for taking care of my son.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was actually the first ever one shot I've written for this AU. Wow, how time flies. I hope you enjoyed it!


End file.
